A back brush is a bathing tool used for the purpose of personal hygiene. Back scrubbers are useful for washing the back or other hard to reach areas of the body. The typical back brush has a wooden or plastic handle and a sponge, mesh, or brush head on one end of the handle.
There are many references that disclose handled back brushes, including, U.S. Pat. No. 6,439,790, issued to Kay. Kay discloses a back brush with a hollow, soap filled handle that releases soap on to the brush head by engaging a dispensing knob. After the soap flows onto the brush head, the user may then scrub the desired area of the body. The dispensing holes disclosed and claimed in Kay are two small holes in the center of the brush that are twisted to align with two brush head apertures. When the holes are aligned with the apertures, soap is allowed to flow through the holes and out through the apertures. The problem with this design is that the user is uncertain when the brush is an open or closed position. Because of this, the user may accidentally leave the brush in the open position and have the soap leak out when not in use. Additionally, the user may accidently bump the brush knob to the closed position and cut off the soap flow while in use.
Other references that disclose handled back brushes include U.S. Pat. No. 6,616,364, issued to Katz, U.S. Pat. No. 7,503,715, issued to Khubani, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,425,701, issued to Jacobs. These devices all disclose a hollow, soap filled handle with a hole in the brush head to dispense the soap. However, the mechanism for dispensing the soap in these references is a standard pushing or pumping mechanism and does not allow the user to twist the brush head to shut off the flow of soap. Additionally, these brushes do not have a plurality of holes and apertures that align in order to allow the free flow of a substantial amount of soap onto the brush head or that unalign to completely cut off the flow of soap. Furthermore, the filler valves disclosed in these references are generally inconvenient and inadequate for repeated fillings. Finally, the prior art does not afford the user efficiency of operating the components of the brush. For example, the prior art does not make it easy for the users to change cleaning heads, open and close the fluid holes, or hide the filler openings.
Thus, what is needed, is a hollow brush that has a discreet filler valve and that allows the user to twist the brush head open to allow the soap to flow out and closed to completely cut off the flow of soap.